Me and my brother started today and we have played for about 1 hour and my brother was disconnected which we shrugged off as it does happen and then he logged onto his town again and it started him from the beginning.

I then logged out to log back in to see if you need to log out to save the village. which would be odd but i thought the game defo looks worth if it to have to do this. I also lost all of my gameplay and it started me out from the begining again!!